On the other hand, the modernists stood out for their blatant rejection of the past. Artists within this Art Deco group sought to find and create an artistic style that was based on new developments in technologies, simplicity, an absence of decoration, and the use of cheaper materials and mass production. Ruhlmann’s lavish style produced different reactions from a number of different Art Deco designers and architects. Le Corbusier, in particular, responded to the types of artworks produced by Ruhlmann by calling for the creation of uncomplicated and more practical furniture pieces instead. However, Ruhlmann strongly believed that the preservation of art relied entirely on the upper class, with his designs going on to perfectly capture the sensational and magnificent spirit of the time.

Delaunay was fascinated with the idea of geometric design, which proved to be modern and essentially fashionable between 1920 and 1930. As a textile designer, in addition to being a painter, Delaunay produced some of her most notable fashion pieces during this time. Color was a major aspect that featured in her works, which she defined as “dynamic art”. Within this traveling cohort, Hoover included important figures from the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the American Institute of Architecture, as well as several individuals from The New York Times. This trip to Europe went on to inspire an almost instantaneous expansion in artistic innovation and creation in the United States. Delaunay’s bold color and textile combinations led to her title of “designer of modern fashion” during the 1925 Exposition in Paris.Completed in less than two years, it was said that approximately four floors were built each week, which was a surprisingly rapid fast for the types of machinery that was available at the time.

In America, the Art Deco movement was met with a completely different approach. Herbert Hoover, who was the Secretary of Commerce then, stated that no American artists and designers were allowed to display their work at the Exposition International in France. This was because Hoover believed that they were yet to come up with an explicitly American style of art that was sufficiently “new enough”. This demonstrated Art Deco’s quest to find beauty in all facets of life, with the movement’s aim reflecting the considerable originality and mass usage of machine-age technology that existed at the time. Art Deco achieved this by focusing on the elegance and appeal of objects that already existed around us, with another accomplishment of the Art Deco era being its truly democratic aim. Artists attempted to make even the plainest and unrefined objects, like machine-made objects, as aesthetically pleasing as possible. Art Deco-style study of the Maharajah d’Indore Mobiliers by Jacques-Émile Ruhlmann, 1932; Jean-Pierre Dalbéra from Paris, France, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons Art Deco-style Hall of the Mirrors inside the Carew Tower, Ohio; EEJCC, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons However, one of Lalique’s most well-known glass sculptures was “Victoire”, which he created in 1928.By 1925, two completely different and contending schools coexisted within the Art Deco movement. These schools were made up of the traditionalists and the modernists. The traditionalists, who had originally established the Society of Decorative Artists, included furniture designer Emile-Jacques Ruhlmann, interior designer Jean Dunant, sculptor Antoine Bordello, and designer Paul Poirot. The Art Deco definition was used in a positive way for the first time by British critic and art historian, Bevis Hillier. His definitive use of the term “Art Deco” in his first book, Art Deco of the 20s and 30s, properly cemented the name into art history. Just like architecture, furniture, the motor industry and the fashion world, publishing embraced Art Deco from around 1915 until the outbreak of World War II. Art Deco cover art can be found in almost every genre from children's fiction to memoirs and countless popular novels. The Book League of America was just one publisher to reprint large quantities of classic novels with Art Deco-styled covers.

The emergence of World War Two seemed to signify Art Deco’s falling from grace. During the wartime years, the restraint of society caused the Art Deco style to seem even more decadent than it already appeared to be, which was ill-fitting in a time of history that was so solemn. The limited supply of metal that could be recovered was used in building military weapons and equipment instead of decorating buildings and interior spaces. In a society that was so grave at the time, objects like furniture were no longer seen as important status items. This was because the Art Deco style was treated as the “Cinderella” of the art world – supposedly inadequate in comparison to the other forms of art that existed. Based on this, the purpose of the exposition was to introduce the new type of decorative art that had formed but was postponed for several reasons until 1925. Her focal points of interest in art history encompass profiling specific artists and art movements, as it is these areas where she is able to really dig deep into the rich narrative of the art world. Additionally, she particularly enjoys exploring the different artistic styles of the 20 th century, as well as the important impact that female artists have had on the development of art history. Seen as quite a structured style, Art Deco took on a very Gatsby-esque self-indulgence based on the types of works created. Adopting features from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s iconic novel, The Great Gatsby, the Art Deco style celebrated the flamboyance, frivolity, and decadence that emerged during the 1920s in America. Just as the characters within Fitzgerald’s book were fixated with the glitz and glamour that was synonymous with the lifestyle at the time, Art Deco celebrated everything that was considered to be luxurious and forward-thinking. Due to this, the greatest achievement of Ruhlmann’s career was said to have been his ability to merge the classical style of the past with the more advanced style of the modern world.

Art Deco-style French Embassy, Plate 22 (after a watercolor by R. Crevel): antechamber by Paul Follot, painted panels by René Crevel, 1925; René Crevel, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons The portrait of Auguste Perret in the Art Deco-style grand staircase of the Palais d’Iéna, Paris, France. The staircase faces the entrance to the conference room, acting as a hinge between the ends of the north and south wings of the Palace. Note that the reinforced concrete columns are tapered down to express “the structural nature of the material”; Jean-Pierre Dalbéra from Paris, France, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons Although he was restrictive when it came to ornamentation, Ruhlmann fashioned his furniture pieces out of the most exotic materials at the time. As a firm favorite of the post-war bourgeois classes, Ruhlmann designed furniture that was able to display the newfound wealth and taste of the recently emerging aristocratic society.

This society helped to slowly expand the definition of art beyond painting and sculpture into other domains that had not been considered before, such as glassware and jewelry. Eventually, those who created Art Deco works that were not considered to be “fine art” before were suddenly viewed as artists instead of mere artisans.As Art Deco design was influenced by industrialization and the technical advancements in society, artworks displayed approval for the modernity of the machine and the innate design qualities of machine-made objects. This led to Art Deco primarily being experimented within design, furniture, architecture, and buildings. As an art movement, the features that defined Art Deco were easily identifiable. Deco art was typically recognized as a hodgepodge of different styles and seen as an eclectic amalgamation of various influences, materials, and shapes. Due to this, it can be hard to differentiate the Art Deco style from other similar schools of art like Art Nouveau, Art Moderne, the Bauhaus school, or the Arts and Craft movement.